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Derek Barton - Biographical

Derek Harold Richard Barton was
born on 8 September 1918, son of William Thomas and Maude
Henrietta Barton. In 1938 he entered Imperial College, University of London,
where he obtained his B.Sc.Hons. (1st Class) in 1940 and Ph.D.
(Organic Chemistry) in 1942. From 1942 to 1944 he was a research
chemist on a government project, from1944-1945 he was with
Messrs. Albright and Wilson, Birmingham. In 1945 he became
assistant lecturer in the Department of Chemistry of Imperial College, from
1946-1949 he was I.C.I. Research Fellow. In 1949 he obtained his
D.Sc. from the same University. During 1949-1950 he was Visiting
Lecturer in the Chemistry of Natural Products, at the Department of
Chemistry, Harvard University (U.S.A.). In 1950 he was
appointed Reader in Organic Chemistry and in 1953 Professor at
Birkbeck
College. In 1955 he became Regius Professor of Chemistry at
the University of
Glasgow, in 1957 he was appointed Professor of Organic
Chemistry at Imperial College, which position he still
holds.

In 1950, in a brief paper in Experientia entitled "The
Conformation of the Steroid Nucleus", Professor Barton showed
that organic molecules in general and steroid molecules in
particular could be assigned a preferred conformation based upon
results accumulated by chemical physicists, in particular by Odd
Hassel. Having chosen a preferred conformation, it was
demonstrated that the chemical and physical properties of a
molecule could be interpreted in terms of that preferred
conformation. In molecules containing fixed rings, such as the
steroids, there resulted a simple relationship between
configuration and conformation, such that configurations could be
predicted once the possible conformations for the products of a
reaction could be analysed. Thus the subject "conformational
analysis" had begun. Barton later determined the geometry of many
other natural product molecules using this method. Conformational
analysis is useful in the elucidation of configuration, in the
planning of organic synthesis, and in the analysis of reaction
mechanisms. It will be fundamental to a complete understanding of
enzymatic processes.

Prof. Barton was invited to deliver the following special
lectures: 1956, Max Tischler Lecturer at Harvard University;
1958, First Simonsen Memorial

Lecturer of the Chemical Society; 1961, Falk-Plaut Lecturer,
Columbia
University; 1962, Aub Lecturer at Harvard Medical
School; Renaud Lecturer at Michigan State University; Inaugural 3 M's
Lecturer, University
of Western Ontario; 1963, Hugo Müller Lecturer of the
Chemical Society; 3 M's Lecturer at the University of
Minnesota; 1967, Pedler Lecturer of the Chemical Society;
1969, Sandin Lecturer at the University of Alberta; 1970, Graham Young
Lectureship, Glasgow.

In 1958 Prof. Barton was Arthur D. Little Visiting Professor at
Massachusetts
Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Mass.; in 1959 Karl
Folkers Visiting Professor at the Universities of Illinois and
Wisconsin.

In 1954 Derek Barton was elected to Fellowship of the Royal
Society, in 1956 he became Fellow of the Royal Society of
Edinburgh; in 1965 he was appointed member of the Council for
Scientific Policy of the U. K.; in 1969 he became President of
Section B, British Association for the Advancement of Science,
and President of the Organic Chemistry Division of the
International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry.

Professor Barton holds the following honours and awards: 1951,
First Corday-Morgan Medal of the Chemical Society; 1956,
Fritzsche Medal of the American Chemical Society; 1959, First
Roger Adams Medal of the American Chemical Society; 1960, Foreign Honorary
Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences; 1961, Davy
Medal of the Royal Society; 1962, D. Sc.h.c. Montpellier; 1964,
D. Sc.h.c. Dublin; 1967, Honorary Fellow of the Deutsche
Akademie der Naturforscher "Leopoldina"; 1969, Honorary Member of
Sociedad Quimica de Mexico; 1970, D.Sc.h.c. St. Andrews:
Fellow of Birkbeck College; Honorary Member of the Belgian
Chemical Society; Foreign Associate of the National Academy of
Sciences; Honorary Member of the Chilean Chemical Society;
D.Sc.h.c., Columbia University, New York; 1971, First award in
Natural Product Chemistry, Chemical Society (London);
D.Sc.h.c., Coimbra (Portugal); Elected Foreign Member of
the Academia das Ciencias de Lisboa; 1972, D. Sc.h.c.
University of
Oxford; Longstaff Medal of the Chemical Society.

Derek Barton was first married to Jeanne Kate Wilkins but this
marriage was later dissolved. He is now married to Christiane
Cognet, a Professor of the Lycée français de Londres.
He has one son, W.G.L. Barton, by his first marriage.

This autobiography/biography was written
at the time of the award and first
published in the book series Les Prix Nobel.
It was later edited and republished in Nobel Lectures. To cite this document, always state the source as shown above.